Russian investigators said Arab operatives linked to Al Qaida played a major role in the takeover of a Russian school in which 400 people were killed.

Russian officials said authorities have determined that 10 of the 32 suicide attackers who took over a high school in Beslan in North Ossetia last week were nationals from several Arab countries. Most of the attackers were Chechens and Ingush who had been trained at Al Qaida camps in Afghanistan.

The 10 Arab nationals came from Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Syria, officials said. They said security forces seized notebooks in Arabic in the school taken over by insurgents. Officials said survivors told authorities that some of the captors spoke Arabic during the three-day hostage ordeal.

All of the captors were said to have been killed, but three accomplices were arrested, Middle East Newsline reported.

The Arab nationals were said to have been recruited in the Middle East and hosted by Shamil Basayev, head of the Chechen insurgency and aligned with Al Qaida.

"We're hoping to release additional information over the next few days," an official said. "But precise details will require cooperation from our allies."

The officials said the attackers were trained in Al Qaida camps in Afghanistan and financed by Abu Omar Al Seif, regarded as a leading Al Qaida operative and the organization's representative in Chechnya.

Al Seif, identified as the chief Islamic ideologue in the Chechen insurgency, was brought to Chechnya in 1995 by Saudi national Samir Saleh Abdullah Al Suwailem, known as Abu Khattab. Abu Khattab was said to have been killed in 2002.

Officials said Basayev received Saudi financial aid for at least a decade, most of it through Al Seif. They said Basayev and Al Seif employed hundreds of Saudi volunteers for suicide and other mass casualty attacks in Chechnya and other parts of Russia as well as raised funds required for the attack on the school in Beslan.

In December 2003, Federal Security Service spokesman Sergei Ignatchenko said virtually all of the suicide attacks in Russia over the last few years were organized by Al Seif and Abu Al Walid. Ignatchenko identified Al Walid as responsible for the Arab fighters in Chechnya.

"Major financial resources reach Al Walid and Abu Omar from extremist centers in a series of Arab countries," Ignatchenko was quoted as saying by the Itar-Tass news agency.

Several Middle East countries planned to increase security cooperation with Russia, officials said. On Monday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov was scheduled to meet Israeli leaders in an effort to pave the way for expanded security cooperation. Saudi Arabia and Turkey have also agreed to increased security cooperation with Moscow. Victims of the insurgency attack included at least one Turkish national.

"The recent terrorist act in Russia has showed the importance of international cooperation in fight against terrorism," Turkish Interior Minister Abdulkadir Aksu said.

Well, they can spike all they want. The world needs to hear this latest development to this story. The more terrorists attacks there are around the world, the more people will realize President George W. Bush is right. We must defeat them in their land so we won't have to deal with them here in our land.

3
posted on 09/06/2004 1:09:30 PM PDT
by no dems
(Pray for the peace of Jerusalem.... (Psalm 122:6))

Ok, where's the response by Prince Abdullah? Once again, his countrymen are involved in terror. What, no statement? Ok, how about some action to stop recruitment and disassemble cells? Sifting sands, sifting sands.

The mainstream media is spiking this important story, because al Queda would do this (or worse) in a heartbeat here in the USA.

They're spiking it because it shows that Arab-Islamic terrorism isn't solely the consequence of Israeli and American "foreign policy," but the consequence of the "religion" of Islam itself. And that un-PC fact horrifies them to no end.

(The mainstream media is) spiking it because it shows that Arab-Islamic terrorism isn't solely the consequence of Israeli and American "foreign policy," but the consequence of the "religion" of Islam itself.

Absolutely true. And it empowers George Bush's plans for dealing with the war.

I don't see how this could be true. I scanned the front page of the NYT today in the airport while travelling (you don't expect me to buy the thing, do you), and according to the Paper Of Record, the terrorists (my word) were "Chechen rebels" and included Russian nationals, as well as "others of undetermined nationality. (sarcasm off...)

Obviously the NYT isn't alert enough to figure out that the thing they all have in common is that they are Muslims, and that at least some of those mystery nationalities are Arabic...

This story is being spiked and spun in a major way indeed, both out of political correctness, and because it would only bolster Bush's contention that we are in the midst of a major worldwide war...

20
posted on 09/06/2004 1:35:58 PM PDT
by Agrarian
(The second most important election of the year is the Senate race in South Dakota -- donate to Thune)

The mainstream media is spiking this important story, because al Queda would do this (or worse) in a heartbeat here in the USA.

"They're spiking it because it shows that Arab-Islamic terrorism isn't solely the consequence of Israeli and American "foreign policy," but the consequence of the "religion" of Islam itself. And that un-PC fact horrifies them to no end."

They are also spiking it as we approach the 3rd anniversary of 9/11. The MSM would like all Americans to forget about 9/11, the mass murdering of 3,000 Americans by al Qaeda and Islamofascists.

The MSM want us to worry about enabling Gays to be married in our churches and how to tax us more for their voters.

The day before yesterday CNN put on the air an Arab journalist in an expensive suit who said there is no excusing or explaining this massacre and then tried to excuse and explain. He said all the Arabs came from countries under occupation and oppression, namely Iraq and Palestan. Of course, he was wrong - they came from Saudi and Syria and Jordan.

Once again the 'rats in the "old media" are trying to spike the news. Their monopoly is broken, their era is over. Now, they just announce their bias and irrelevency, because even Joe Sixpack can see through them.

you would think all the journalists being killed would do such. Remember one thing, Saudi oil money supposedly is linked to world media. I don't have facts on this so I would need someone to confirm. Most reporters, broadcast, written or otherwise are part of corporate structures and are "managed". Some might want to tell the truth, but they'd only get it out once. And sometimes never.

Your right, but it gets tiresome. And the stakes are higher than many realize. So many of my coworkers(UAW) do not believe a terrorist attack can happen here again. It's only a matter of when and where.

It's more a matter of differing perspectives between the media and the public.

Anyone with strong familiarity of Al Qaeda and Chechnya understands that the "Chechen resistance" wouldn't even exist without Al Qaeda. The Chechen resistence is Al Qaeda and vice versa.

There aren't enough "separatists" in Chechnya to fill Texas Stadium, (even today) and there wouldn't be any at all if Al Qaeda hadn't been setting up the "resistance" for over a decade.

Anyone with strong familiarity on the topic who saw two commercial aircraft explode within four minutes of each other didn't even bother to ask if Al Qaeda was involved, it was simply that obvious.

SOP for Al Qaeda is simultaneous attacks, and an inferred claim of responsibility through some invented terrorist group that no-one's ever heard of before, but that uses names obliquely related to Al Qaeda and past Al Qaeda attacks. For example, "Abu Hafs Martyr's Brigade", refers to Mohammed Atef (alias Abu Hafs), Al Qaeda's top military planner, who succeeded Banshiri and completed the planning and execution of the African Embassy bombings when Banshiri was killed in a ferry accident, and who was killed in a US bombing raid during Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan.

The rising "furor" over Al Qaeda involvement in the entire series of recent attacks in Russia is of the same significance as the flap over whether ETA or Al Qaeda blew up the Spanish trains just before the election.

I'm not one to defend the media, but in this one case, they aren't exactly covering up this angle, they more seem to be just not over-emphasizing what appears to be obvious to them.

Once you accept that Al Qaeda wasn't only involved in, but was the prime planner, financier, and motivator for the entire string of recent Russian attacks, the door opens to ask much more interesting questions, such as:

1. Why did AQ target specifically Russia?

2. Why now?

3. Was the coincidence in timing between the string of attacks and the Republican National Convention simply a matter of random chance?

4. Is the string of attacks over for now?

5. If there was a correlation between the timing of the attacks and the Convention, why didn't Al Qaeda simply attack in America instead of Russia?

6. Overall, what was Al Qaeda's purpose and objective behind this string of attacks?

7. Have those objectives been met to Al Qaeda's satisfaction?

8. Is this string of attacks actually over now, or is Russia to expect still more?

Simultaneous attacks, at least in the past decade and to date, have always been Al Qaeda's handiwork. Dispensing with the entire "Was it Al Qaeda or (fill in the blank)" process allows us all to get to the meat of the implications that much faster, which then ties into the whole idea of getting inside their decision making loop.

I've had a plan for a long time, but everyone mad enough to want in is too mad to take what appears to be an ineffective route.

The major leftist media is wide open for a class action suit.

They have demonstrably (right on the front page) lied in documented ways that have demonstrably damaged a large number of people in material ways.

There are two key elements to making it happen.

One is to convince the lawyers that there is at least the possibility of a settlement or favorable verdict, because they will gamble, but not throw away their time for no return.

Two is to convince them that a large enough number of people feel thay have been materially damaged to drive the payoff up into ten to twelve figures. With left and right roughly balanced in America, that works out to 140 million plaintiffs and only ten bucks damage each.

We, on the other hand, win whether we get a verdict or not, because regardless of the outcome, the majors will have to tighten their editorial policy in light of the increased scrutiny and the incredible expense of discovery and their defense of what could end up a multi-billion dollar settlement.

Even the Adminsitration shouldn't have objections, as their hands are clean, no claims of Republican's trying to stifle the First Amendment can be laid.

All you have to do is talk it up until an attorney with the resources to gamble a bit picks it up and runs with it, the rest will take care of itself.

Officials said Basayev received Saudi financial aid for at least a decade, most of it through Al Seif. They said Basayev and Al Seif employed hundreds of Saudi volunteers for suicide and other mass casualty attacks in Chechnya and other parts of Russia as well as raised funds required for the attack on the school in Beslan.

We might get lucky... If the Russians "retire" a few aging ICBMs that way. That would surely cost less than dismantling them.

Remember one thing, Saudi oil money supposedly is linked to world media.

They are. The media was radical. After the fall of the USSR, the only radical idea left was Wahhabism. MSM offered their a$$es. The sodomites accepted. Done deal. That beast of the beasts, Radical Islam absorbed everything evil from Nazism, communism and primitive paganism. But whores are whores. There was no choice left.

Disclaimer:
Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual
posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its
management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the
exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.